The theories underlying community policing received new impetus with the recent advent of smartphones and social media and especially the notion of user-generated content where the users are citizens engaged in closer interaction with their local community and law enforcement agency. The five years 2010-2014 have seen a rapid upsurge of smartphone apps aimed at improving crime reporting and other forms of UGC and interaction associated with community policing.

CITYCoP sets out to learn what are the common features and the best practices embraced by apps which may have been successful worldwide and determine why apparently promising ones may have failed. It then goes on to produce a uniquely European solution including a smartphone app and an on-line portal, which are capable of being deployed in every European city while still retaining the 'local flavour' and diversity.

The goal is to engage the citizen and law enforcement agencies in mutual learning of local policing practices, exchange information and alerts, and provide for a platform to develop inclusive problem solving methodologies. A training scheme, including the use of serious games, will be developed to assist the training of officers and citizens in the uptake of the community policing app and portal. The project will outline best practices for police cooperation with the public, directly for community engagement, the use of technology in community policing, and to establish community policing policies in law enforcement agencies.

• To analyse the social, cultural, legal and ethical issues that affect the building of trust in community policing through technology.
• To identify and address previous failures/limitations in the use of technology in community policing by reviewing existing practices worldwide.
• To understand how the use of technology in community policing models is received by law enforcement agencies and citizens in selected European cities and the factors that contribute to success in terms of building trust and improving crime reporting.
• To produce a uniquely European technical solution including a smartphone app and an on-line portal, which are capable of being deployed in every European city while still retaining the “local flavour” and diversity.
• To develop a system with the aim to facilitate information sharing and trust building between citizens and law enforcement agencies and to pilot the CITYCoP system in four diverse major cities and their surroundings.
• To train law enforcement agencies and citizens through serious gaming to facilitate the right information sharing that will allow to prevent, detect and prosecute criminal behaviour efficiently.
• To carry out a complete data protection and ethical audit of the CITYCoP system.
• To develop a CITYCoP Toolkit that can be used by other cities inside and outside Europe which may want to adopt the CITYCoP system.

Partners

• University of Groningen (RUG), Netherlands
• Leibniz Universität Hannover (LUH), Germany
• Laboratory of Citizenship Sciences (LSC), Italy
• University of Malta (UM), Malta
• Hoplite Software, Salamanda, Spain
• Law and Internet Foundation (LIF), Bulgaria
• Fraunhofer Institut für Intelligente Analyse- und Informationssysteme (Fraunhofer IAIS)
• The University of Novi Sad, Serbia
• Nutcracker Research Ltd (NUTC), UK
• Consiglio Nazionale Delle Ricerche – CNR, Italy
• The Special Telecommunications Service (STS), Romania
• 'Mihai Viteazul' National Intelligence Academy (MVNIA), Romania
• The Advanced Technology Institute (ATI), Romania
• youris.com (European Research Media Center)
• Norwegian University Of Science & Technology (NTNU), Norway
• South Yorkshire Police (SYP), UK
• Ministry Of Home Affairs - Public Security Police (PSP), Portugal
• Comune Di Firenze, Italy
• Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights
• Fédération Autonome De La Fonction Publique Territoriale (FAFPT), France
• General Inspectorate of Romanian Police, Romania
• Lower Saxony Ministry of Interiors and Sport – Police Directorate of Brunswick, Lower Saxony, Germany